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An Analysis of the Financial and Investment Activities of the Chilean Development Corporation: 1939-1964

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An Analysis of the Financial and Investment Activities of the Chilean Development Corporation: 1939-1964 Yale University EliScholar – A Digital Platform for Scholarly Publishing at Yale Discussion Papers Economic Growth Center 4-20-1967 An Analysis of the Financial and Investment Activities of the Chilean Development Corporation: 1939-1964 Markos Mamalakis Follow this and additional works at: https://elischolar.library.yale.edu/egcenter-discussion-paper-series Recommended Citation Mamalakis, Markos, "An Analysis of the Financial and Investment Activities of the Chilean Development Corporation: 1939-1964" (1967). Discussion Papers. 31. https://elischolar.library.yale.edu/egcenter-discussion-paper-series/31 This Discussion Paper is brought to you for free and open access by the Economic Growth Center at EliScholar – A Digital Platform for Scholarly Publishing at Yale. It has been accepted for inclusion in Discussion Papers by an authorized administrator of EliScholar – A Digital Platform for Scholarly Publishing at Yale. For more information, please contact [email protected]. ECONOMIC GROWTH CENTER YALE UNIVERSITY Box 1987, Yale Station New Haven, Connecticut CENTER DISCUSSION PAPER NO. 23 AN ANALYSIS OF THE FINANCIAL AND INVESTMENT ACTIVITIES OF THE CHILEAN DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION: 1939-1964 Markos Mamalakis April 20, 1967 Note: Center Discussion Papers are preliminary materials circulated to stimulate discussion and critical comment. References in publications to Discussion Papers should be cleared with the author to protect the tentative character of these papers. INTRODUCTION* The night of October 25, 1938, the Popular Front came to power in Chile under the aegis of Pedro Aguirre Cerda. Twenty-six years later, the Christian Democrats won the Presidency as the nation united behind Eduardo Frei against the far left represented by Salvador Allende. The year 1964 witnessed also the 25th anniversary of the Chilean Develop­ 1 ment Corporation, CORFO, the powerful semi-fiscal organization created in 1939 by the Popular Front to pursue its Development Program. Since the 25th anniversary of CORFO in 1964, the air has been filled again with the same commercial and economic philosophy that so strongly swept over the country a quarter of a century ago. After the years of the policies of Finance Minister Vergara and President Alles­ sandri at the end of the decade of the fifties, when the private sector was envisaged as the primum mobile and the state restrained itself to providing the stimuli necessary for growth, there has been a visible re­ turn to the Popular Front's philosophy that injections of public invest­ ment and extensive government intervention in the resource allocation pro­ cess are a sine qua non for accelerated economic growth. While the first wave of pro-government philosophy brought along CORFO, in the new setting of 1964-6; CORF0 1 s major finance and investment 2 roles were to be both renewed and expanded. As the country has embarked *The author acknowledges the cooperation of the officials of CORFO and in particular by those working in the Financiai Section and\ the Oil, Sugar Beet and Electricity subsidiaries. Most of the statistical, information included in this pa2er has r.c,t been published before either in English or in Spanish, but made available by these various officials. This essay was written in Santiago, Chile, during the author's leave of absence from Yale and association with the Institute of Economics of the University of C~ile. Juan Crocco, Eduardo Garcia and Keith Griffin have maye useful comments on an earlier draft of this paper. This organization (Corporaci6n de Fomento de la Producci6n CORFO) will be henceforth referred to either as CORFO or the Corporation. 2 rn spite of its renewed significance, government has transferred the planning, national accounts and related research activities, which were traditional functions of CORFO, to the Oficina de Planificacion de la Presidencia de la Republica (ODEPLAN) (Planning Office of the Presidency of the Republic). -2- on a new development effort with the same enthusiasm, but undoubtedly with more caution, experience and balance than in the year of CORFO's birth, a review and evaluation of CORFO's major activities is justified by a desire to unravel the mechanisms by which government has attempted to affect the allocation of resources and evaluate their effectiveness in an underdeveloped country and derive lessons for future policies both in Chile and elsewhere, Instead of covering all aspects of the Corporation's activities, we will, after a short historical review, con­ centrate on its major finance and investment activities, which appear to be of central significance. PART I Genesis and Growth of CORFO Although the strong earthquake of January 1939 provided the ex­ cuse for the establishment of the Chilean Development Corporation, the roots of CORFO are found in the prolonged and powerful depression that shook economy and economic policy alike in the early thirties. In the tradition of independence common both to Chileans and the Araucanian Indians, CORFO was a nationalist, Chile-focused institution. In spite of the fact that the Great Depression acted as a powerful shock upon the Chilean economy, it left intact the social and economic structure of agriculture, and also did not affect the foreign control over the mining sector, CORFO, which was created after production and employ­ ment had exceeded appreciably the levels of the depression, established as its goals the increase and diversification of output. However, it lacked both the intent and power to transform mining and agriculture in a way that would make them compatible with the new economic and social organization of the other sectors. The rather enthusiastic support given to CORFO at its inception (even the right wing conservatives that tried to boycott it found many aspects worth praising) reflected the culmination of numerous concurring I -3- 1 forces. The conservative right advocated nationalistic policies; the socialists welcomed government intervention; and the newly created class of engineers, technicians, and specialists favored industrializa­ tion schemes because they enabled professionals to gain power by entering into up-to-now closed terrains of the decision making process. In an era and country where the demands for change had become progressively stronger, it reflected the aspirations and hopes of the majority of the Chilean population. The philosophy that inspired its creation placed emphasis on 2 two tenets: the first advocated the need of an inward-oriented and nationally controlled self-propelling development effort. Its major facets were self-sufficiency and development of an economic system complete with 11 all11 sectors; the importance of the export sector was deemphasized, The second tenet related to the role and relative quantitative importance of the public sector. It stated that, in order to achieve the desired level and pattern of growth, the public sector would have to assume primary re­ sponsibility for action. Smallness of domestic capital markets, lack of 1 The literature concerning CORFO is very scant and even then most of it unpublished. It includes The Chilean Develoement Corporation by Herman Finer (Montreal: The International Labour Office) 1947, 84 p.; Kalman H. Silvert, "The Chilean Development Corporation" 1952, unpublished Ph.D. Thesis, Tulane University, 173 p. which is a political science oriented research work that also provides useful economic insights. The Chilean Development Corporation (New York: Corporaci6n de Fomento de la Producci6n) 1962, 13 p.; Corporaci6n de Fomento de la Producci6n, Dis­ posiciones Legales (Santiago de Chile: Departamento de Fiscalia, CORFO) 1959, 161 p. which contains all major laws concerning CORFO; 11 CORFO, Labor realizada entre los anos 1952-195611 mimeographed, 1957; "La Corporaci6n de Fomento de la Producci6n11 Chile, 1962, mimeographed, 30 p. which is a useful summary of the various aspects of CORFO; "Cuestionario sobre Plani­ ficaci6n Econ6mia preparado par el Nederlandsch Economisch Institute de 11 Rotherdam, Rolanda, bajo la direcci6n de Jan Tinbergen • This document contains, in a mimeographed form, the questions submitted by the Tinbergen group and the answers given by CORFO; it also provides insights concerning the state of economic planning by CORFO. The Panorama Econ6mico, a bi­ I weekly semi-popular journal has occasionally published highly informative I. essays concerning CORFO and its subsidiaries. Panorama .. Econ6micg which I carries the subtitle Review of Information and Polemics (Revista de Infor­ maci6n v Polemica) carried on June 4, 1954 a Sonderschrift on CORFO: Labor de 15 anos y Perspectivas (CORFO: 15 years of Work and Perspectives) No. 101. 2 It also placed emphasis on a third concept: the need to prepare a plan that would permit rational intervention and would introduce to the decision-making process a long-run dimension. : I ! I -4- private Chilean entrepreneurship, and the high social desirability of major investments with low private rates of return (especially those involving the industrial infrastructure such as energy, power, steel and so forth) were advanced as the primary causes for the need of en­ larged government intervention. Government was imagined as the all­ powerful agent which would cure all existing defic4encies. The first notion led to long-run trade-aversion, the second to an apotheosis of the public sector. In accordance with clause (a), of article 25, Law No. 6640, CORFO was created to: Formulate a General Plan for the Development of Production, destined to elevate the standard of living of the population by taking advantage of the natural resources of the country and the lowering of the costs of production, and to improve the situation of the balance of international payments, bearing in mind, in establishing the plan, the necessary equilibrium in the development of mining, agricultural, industrial and trade activities, and at the same time aiming to satisfy the needs of the various regions of the country. As the principa 1 agent in the government's development efforts, it has acted as a financier, entrepreneur, investor, innovator and researcher, and frontierman. Through these roles, it has dominated economic life in Chile since 1939.
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